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It's the rep level on GOG - at 25 stars you get 1 star, by 500 it is 3 stars by 2000 it is 5 (the highest star-level). I don't think it means anything, though there was a rumor that 5 stars got you something but I can't remember if that turned out to be true. ---------------

I'm sure this is just my ignorance, but why does soldering the CPU on the motherboard kill the Desktop? Why does it even kill the enthusiast? I'm confused.

Fenixp: I... Don't really mind, actually. I have never really upgraded a CPU without also upgrading my motherboard, so all in all it'll just remove some hassle. And put intel into a powerful position, which is the bit I dislike.

ginsengsamurai: Exactly. When I make upgrades, I usually upgrade RAM, hard drive, video cards and other peripherals. When I find I 'need' a new CPU, I buy the entire computer new or CPU+MoBo. I've been doing that since the late 1990's. So I don't see how this is 'new news'.

Also as far as "PC's are dying", well I disagree. Just because there are more alternatives, having a few hundred million PC's are still a few hundred million PC's. That's not quite 'dying', but more like "there are more options other than PC's".

Oh I just noticed I got a star. What's a star?

You get stars as your rep increases. I think it tops out at 5 stars. But it takes longer and longer to get one each star.

The only reason that I would worry about this is that it means you can't replace just the processor if it breaks down. Or if the caps go on the motherboard you also have to buy a new processor.

Well upgrading for me, not so much, BUT if it's about replacing the CPU because it's fried, that would make sense. It's actually a waste if I have to replace the entire MoBo just because of a faulty CPU.

Well upgrading for me, not so much, BUT if it's about replacing the CPU because it's fried, that would make sense. It's actually a waste if I have to replace the entire MoBo just because of a faulty CPU.

TBH, that's really the only reason I can think of for wanting to replace a processor these days. I think I've upgraded a processors once or twice, but I've found the performance gains to be insufficient for the cost.

And even for fried processors, I don't think that's very common unless you're overclocking, at least not when it's just the processor and not the MB as well.

Most of the time I find that I need a new GPU, because the processor is fast enough. I'll probably buy a new computer when I go home, the last one though is like 4 years old, and it was pretty inexpensive at the time. I think TW2 is the only game I've tried to play which didn't run on it.

hedwards: TBH, that's really the only reason I can think of for wanting to replace a processor these days. I think I've upgraded a processors once or twice, but I've found the performance gains to be insufficient for the cost.

And even for fried processors, I don't think that's very common unless you're overclocking, at least not when it's just the processor and not the MB as well.

Most of the time I find that I need a new GPU, because the processor is fast enough. I'll probably buy a new computer when I go home, the last one though is like 4 years old, and it was pretty inexpensive at the time. I think TW2 is the only game I've tried to play which didn't run on it.

So I take it that the article title is a huge exaggeration then? Because if from the end-user's perspective making a seldom repair-upgrade more expensive, if you hadn't planned to change the motherboard which most do anyway for an upgrade at least, seems a far cry from killing the Desktop or enthusiast market. I don't build my own computers so I'm more than willing to admit that there may be a dimension to this I'm totally missing, but that doesn't seem so terrible as to kill a market or especially an entire form-factor.

crazy_dave: So I take it that the article title is a huge exaggeration then? Because if from the end-user's perspective making a seldom repair-upgrade more expensive, if you hadn't planned to change the motherboard which most do anyway for an upgrade at least, seems a far cry from killing the Desktop or enthusiast market. I don't build my own computers so I'm more than willing to admit that there may be a dimension to this I'm totally missing, but that doesn't seem so terrible as to kill a market or especially an entire form-factor.

I think that enthusiasts are the only people that are likely to notice. And even they probably don't care because they'll buy the fastest chip that a motherboard supports anyways.

I think this is a case of Intel knowing their market and wanting to take advantage of the benefits of soldered on components.

Now, if we were talking about soldered on GPUs being the only option, that would be a completely different matter. But, processors seem to largely be fast enough for current games anyways, I know I've upgraded my GPU like 3 times with the last computer purchase haven't upgraded my CPU on it's own in over a decade.

hedwards: I wouldn't think so. You've got a lot of short sighted people that will buy Intel regardless of how bad their behavior is.

Never mind the fact that they're criminal scum who used blackmail and extortion to break AMD when they were at their peak and absolutely trouncing Intel (kind of like how Intel are trouncing them now).

So no, I don't think for one second that they'd think twice about destroying AMD. I wouldn't put much past them at all. When sci fi bangs on about big evil mega corporations they're talking about the kind of companies Intel is destined to become one of (assuming it survives, which I sincerely hope it doesn't).

Yes I do hate Intel. Seeing evil triumph is never very pleasing. Unless you're evil, of course.

hedwards: I wouldn't think so. You've got a lot of short sighted people that will buy Intel regardless of how bad their behavior is.

Navagon: Never mind the fact that they're criminal scum who used blackmail and extortion to break AMD when they were at their peak and absolutely trouncing Intel (kind of like how Intel are trouncing them now).

So no, I don't think for one second that they'd think twice about destroying AMD. I wouldn't put much past them at all. When sci fi bangs on about big evil mega corporations they're talking about the kind of companies Intel is destined to become one of (assuming it survives, which I sincerely hope it doesn't).

Yes I do hate Intel. Seeing evil triumph is never very pleasing. Unless you're evil, of course.

Doesn't matter what they want to do, the only reason the various regulatory agencies haven't come down harder on them is that there's a competitor.

Ultimately, the DoJ and the European equivalent fell down on the job previously. But, if AMD does go tits up, then, well, you'd have to be Mr. Magoo not to realize that the agencies will have to pay much more attention to what Intel is doing.

Ultimately, you can blame the fascists for this. Although, I know some people will argue that it's free market and will kill kittens if regulators regulate.

The way it seems to me, one way or another, AMD won't even be a competitor anymore anyway. That's regardless of whether or not they survive. Clearly Intel want to focus on closed platforms, which pretty much ends any competition between them and AMD, unless AMD decide to go the same route.

hedwards: Ultimately, you can blame the fascists for this. Although, I know some people will argue that it's free market and will kill kittens if regulators regulate.

Yeah, but they're part of the problem, aren't they? So who cares what they think. If it was up to them it would practically be a corporate warzone out there by now.

hedwards: Ultimately, the DoJ and the European equivalent fell down on the job previously. But, if AMD does go tits up, then, well, you'd have to be Mr. Magoo not to realize that the agencies will have to pay much more attention to what Intel is doing.

Ultimately, you can blame the fascists for this. Although, I know some people will argue that it's free market and will kill kittens if regulators regulate.

If AMD goes tits up Intel will likely be forced to split by the DoJ much like they threatened MS with 15ish years ago. Intel has an interest in keeping AMD active I wouldn't be suprised if AMD announces a large cash injection and purchase of a few chip design companies soon. Tbh though while AMD is not currently competitive in the enthusiast market they are pretty damn good in the Laptop and low power/HTPC arena they just need to get more mindshare (which they can't afford to create). Apparently though there's going to be a LOT more gaming evolved games this next couple of years

hedwards: Ultimately, you can blame the fascists for this. Although, I know some people will argue that it's free market and will kill kittens if regulators regulate.

Navagon: Yeah, but they're part of the problem, aren't they? So who cares what they think. If it was up to them it would practically be a corporate warzone out there by now.

Well, I care, they get to vote. I personally think that fascists should be barred from voting, but they do still get to vote. The DoJ under W did basically nothing to enforce those particular laws. And it was primarily fascists and religious nutjobs that put him in the office.

KyleKatarn: I can actually agree with your view on the "free market" for once!

What's your thought on having some kind of separation of business and state? It's not like businesses would never lobby the government to give them political favoritism again but at least the government could point and say, "We can't do that." like they can do now when a religious group wants to demonize and eliminate another group of heretics.

orcishgamer: Well, I think we need the term "free market" eliminated, there's too much baggage and it was always a fantasy anyway. If, though, you're asking if a healthy market can exist, the answer is "yes, of course it can", but it would be controlled and have restrictions put on it. It only takes a few bad actors to be incredibly destructive, and if they're so successful they start to strangle the competition by virtue (I use the term loosely) of their sociopathic practices more businesses will face the Sophie's Choice of either joining them or dying (and possibly destroying the other good they were doing in the process).

There is no winning in that scenario. However, I think the whole thing skips over the real question: do we need an economy at all in the way we've traditionally envisioned it? I'd argue that our current economy is a fossil of a world that no longer actually exists.

We have two paths, as always, I love sci-fi for the premises it presents (something fantasy typically doesn't do as a genre, you know, because hacks like Stephanie Meyer and JK Rawling need to be billionaires instead), here's a free short story that illustrates our two paths, which one would you pick? Are we so very removed from the "good" world presented in the story? We've already basically invented Star Trek style replicators for some types of goods and it's literally causing a dystopia, which is ironic...

And here I thought you were implying that all those government privileges should be done away with! I'm assuming that you don't want a separation of business and state because then the state couldn't tell people with private property how to use their property.

I agree with Bastiat that it's only natural for the many to want to vote themselves privileges from the few when most of the few got their extreme wealth by taking from the many with government privileges in the first place. The many will say that if the the few can do it, so can we and they will vote themselves benefits too. Basically it will turn into communism. He called it legal plunder and the correct solution to this is that no one shall be allowed to legally plunder anyone else.

It's one thing for the government to act like ref in a sports game when they regulate to promote good sportsmanship and are fair and consistent with the rules for everyone, quite another if they were to add two yards on to every run by the Dallas Cowboys running back because Jerry Jones just built a new stadium and if the Cowboys lose the game their attendance might drop and that will cut into Jones' cost recovery from building the stadium. Also, half of the opposition's playbook is disallowed even though it follows the rules because they have hired athletes that will excel with that team's system while the Cowboys will have a hard time defending against it, and we can't have that because of cost recovery. That's how electricity regulation works.

We have two choices? Really? So it's simple dualism then, I guess. One side has a monopoly on good and one side has a monopoly on evil. I suppose religious people would have had two choices back when there was state religion. You could be Catholic or be a heretic. We get a separation of church and state by having an amendment that says people are free to seek any religion they want or even none at all without the state punishing their choice and now atheists, Christians (with it's many derivatives), deists, naturalists, Taoists, Buddhists, etc. all can tolerate each other.

I read to chapter 5 in the book you linked last night. This automation hysteria isn't new. It should have happened over 40 years ago already. I remember Rothbard complaining about it when he was complaining about intellectuals who favored state planning when they would change their intellectual fashions like ladies' hemlines, as he put it. There were seven positions over four decades that he listed, often contradictory.

1. 1930's, early 40's. Problem: Capitalism was suffering inevitable secular stagnation. No further inventions were possible and there would be permanent mass unemployment. Solution: State planning/socialism to replace free market capitalism.

2. 1950's. Finally there was a boom after deficit spending finally stopped. Not really a boom, just that consumption shrank with all that spending from the government and then consumption increased after they stopped the insane spending. Problem: Capitalism was growing, but wasn't growing fast enough. Solution: State planning to maximize rate of growth even if people didn't want to grow that fast.

3. Late 50's. The Affluent Society was a best-seller. Problem: Capitalism had grown too much, no longer stagnant but everyone was too well off and people had lost their spirituality amidst supermarkets. Solution: State planning and tax consumers heavily to reduce their bloated affluence.

Here it is, automation. I'll just copy here what he wrote. Mid 60's 5. Stagnation; deficient growth; overaffluence; overpoverty; the intellectual fashions changed like ladies' hemlines. Then, in 1964, the happily short-lived Ad Hoc Committee on the Triple Revolution issued its then-famous manifesto, which brought us and the liberal intellectuals full circle. For two or three frenetic years we were regaled with the idea that America's problem was not stagnation but the exact reverse: in a few short years all of America's production facilities would be automated and cybernated, incomes and production would be enormous and superabundant, but everyone would be automated out of a job. Once again, free-market capitalism would lead to permanent mass unemployment, which could only be remedied — you guessed it! — by massive State intervention or by outright socialism. For several years, in the mid-1960s, we thus suffered from what was justly named the "Automation Hysteria."

6. Automation Hysteria didn't materialize. He didn't put in a position here, just pointed that out.

7. Late 60's and early 70's. Affluence is once again excessive. Free market capitalism is growing much too fast. Problem: Free market capitalism is destroying resources (in the Tragedy of the Commons debate, the knock on capitalism is The Tragedy of the Anti-Commons, or that resources won't be used enough, much different than what the movies depict) and technology is an evil polluter. Capitalism's growth has also caused bad population growth. Solution: State planning to bring about a zero-growth society in order to avoid future negative growth.

As Schumpeter put it in a nutshell : "Capitalism stands its trial before judges who have the sentence of death in their pockets. They are going to pass it, whatever the defense they may hear; the only success victorious defense can possibly produce is a change in the indictment."

How's this for a Sophie's Choice. Pretend you own private property in Germany before WWII. Fascists have taken power. Your choice is to be liquidated on one side under communism or on the other side under the fascists you can continue to appear to own private property so long as you only act for the state's interests. You will be regulated to comply and then penalized if you don't act in the state's interests, "Nothing outside the State". As one leader put it, they don't need to bother socializing banks or production, they socialize people. Well, I guess it's better than being liquidated.

I'll keep my "fairy tale" free market and my private property that helps ensure that transactions are voluntary and mutually beneficial. If the government wants to do something, they can be enablers of that, not top-down architects.

hedwards: Ultimately, the DoJ and the European equivalent fell down on the job previously. But, if AMD does go tits up, then, well, you'd have to be Mr. Magoo not to realize that the agencies will have to pay much more attention to what Intel is doing.

Ultimately, you can blame the fascists for this. Although, I know some people will argue that it's free market and will kill kittens if regulators regulate.

wodmarach: If AMD goes tits up Intel will likely be forced to split by the DoJ much like they threatened MS with 15ish years ago. Intel has an interest in keeping AMD active I wouldn't be suprised if AMD announces a large cash injection and purchase of a few chip design companies soon. Tbh though while AMD is not currently competitive in the enthusiast market they are pretty damn good in the Laptop and low power/HTPC arena they just need to get more mindshare (which they can't afford to create). Apparently though there's going to be a LOT more gaming evolved games this next couple of years

That's why I don't think that Intel will let AMD go out of business. I'm not sure if they'll slow their advances to let AMD catch up, or if they will invest in AMD. MS did something similar in the '90s to keep Apple in the game, it wasn't a huge amount of money, well in corporate terms, but they needed Apple in order to avoid even more drastic measures being taken against them.

don't kill desktops within the year i'm just now reaching a point where it seems that I may soon be at the intersection of learning how to do so time and money to only need inclination to do so and I was eventually going to think about doing that :(

Elmofongo: So it is impossible to be in this buisness even if the market leader leaves completely.

orcishgamer: No, when Intel was stagnating on purpose, releasing crappy, incremental boosts for a whole 33 MHz at a time, AMD came in and fucked them up bad. They even beat Intel to 1 GHz, which was a big deal at the time (I think I still have one of those chips somewhere).

When the market leader is doing shit, then you can come up and kick their ass, with a lot of capital anyway.

But what you're seeing is a general issue with so called "free market", they're not really free in any sense because between actual market entrenchment and the social and political favoritism they'll have secured for themselves, including but not limited to tax breaks, special zoning and permits, right of way, first dibs/monopoly on essential public resources, right of way, etc., there is no "free market" way to compete.

Throw in our fucked up patent and copyright systems and you've managed to almost completely shatter the whole free market fairy tale.

Is that why North Korea rivals South Korea in making computer technology? Is that how the Soviet Union started the computer revolution? Is this how IBM maintained their monopoly and prevented Microsoft from rising? Is this how Microsoft maintained their monopoly and Apple had no chance of ever beating them?

Do tell us more about this 'fairytale' you've conjured. We'd all love to hear more.

And since you don't seem to like copyrights, I'll just claim everything you've written as my own. After all, it's a 'screwed up system'. I'm sure you won't mind.

orcishgamer: Well, I think we need the term "free market" eliminated, there's too much baggage and it was always a fantasy anyway.

We should also eliminate the term 'clean food'. There is no such thing as 'clean food'. All food has contaminants. There is no 'pure' food.